


Dodging the Question

by parallelmonsoon



Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Angst, Blood, Drama, Gen, Hellish dream scape, Inflicting trauma as self-therapy, Is it self defense if you're defending yourself from yourself?, SvS2 spoilers, Sympathetic Creativity | Roman "Princey" Sanders, Sympathetic Deceit Sanders, Sympathetic Morality | Patton Sanders, Violence, pushed to the edge and over, sympathetic everyone
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-05
Updated: 2020-05-05
Packaged: 2021-03-02 20:14:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,598
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24012652
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/parallelmonsoon/pseuds/parallelmonsoon
Summary: They face off under the blasted red sky. Thomas stands behind Deceit.  Patton's sickly-pale throat bulges.  He spits his venom (words, just words, and there's nothing more dangerous) and Deceit does the hardest thing he's ever had to do.He steps aside.
Comments: 23
Kudos: 290





	Dodging the Question

**Author's Note:**

> Will probably not make much sense if you haven't seen the new episode. I apologize in advance if this duplicates- I'm encountering a weird glitch lately.
> 
> Inspired by https://queenofspades010.tumblr.com/post/617056454503972864/thatsthat24-fml-patton-took-a-million-years-but

It's necessary.

There's a tipping point. Sometimes things need to break to heal.

So he nudges. He speaks in Logan's voice of sacrifice, and when Patton flinches Janus only pushes harder.

“What **should** Thomas do in **that** kind of situation?” Roman asks, and Janus wonders if he realizes just how close Patton is to the edge.

...and Patton falls. Falls, and drags them all down into his nightmare with him.

The living room around them is a ruin. The familiar furniture overturned and torn, clots of stuffing spilling from the wounds. Under their feet the carpet squelches, soaked through with something that doesn't bear thinking about. The walls are rubble, and beyond them mountains of black obsidian glisten under a blasted red sky. The clouds look like they're boiling, roiling thick in shades of crimson, and the air smells of ozone and wet pennies.

Patton screams, raw and hurt and terrible. And then it twists, becomes a gurgle first and then a guttural croak.

Patton isn't Patton anymore. He towers over them, a thing of blubbery skin and bulging eyes. His fingers and toes are spindly and tipped by suction cups that pulse and ooze ichor. Most of his clothing drifts down in tatters, but the collar of his shirt presses deep into the pale, swollen skin of his throat.

Thomas tries to calm the beast that Patton has become. Janus...Janus keeps pushing.

It isn't hard. All he needs to do is keeping asking the same question. Patton growls and gurgles and denies them all an answer. A twist of those long, long fingers and a man is writhing in his grip, kicking and screaming and begging for his life.

Roman is crouched, hand hovering the hilt of his sword. Janus will be both shocked and impressed if he finds the courage to actually draw it.

But Roman hesitates, and Janus cannot find it in himself to blame him. The prince does not fear the monster, he knows. He fears hurting his friend, and if only Janus were allowed such luxuries!

Roman asks for a different example. The man Patton holds tumbles screaming into the void. Now it is Lee and Mary Lee who tremble and cry out in Patton's too-tight hold. A flash of lightning makes the tears on their cheeks sparkle like costume glitter.

The world smears around them. When it reforms the ground itself is a vast field of slow churning magma. Bubbles rise and burst, reeking of sulfur.

A rickety trestle bridge extends to the horizon on either side, worm-eaten wood and rusted rails, splitting into two paths that run parallel. On one Thomas lays bound. On the other, Lee and Mary Lee.

' _Steady,'_ Janus tells himself, because he can feel Thomas' fear. Part of Thomas knows that none of this is real. But he can feel the heat prickling his skin, can feel the rumble underneath him as the trolley comes barreling down. Thomas squeezes his eyes closed and wonders if he'll feel the pain too.

“Enough!” The cry is torn from Janus' chest despite himself.

He reaches out. Grabs hold of the dreamscape and _twists_. It resists, because this is Patton's realm, not his, but Thomas' terror gives Janus strength. A dizzying spin and they are back under that blasted red sky.

An ill-considered impulse, perhaps, but no matter. Janus is not done pushing yet.

He knows this game he's playing is dangerous. There are ways of breaking that one can come back from. Sometimes stronger, or sometimes just different, the bits and pieces cobbled together in a new way.

But there are other ways, too. He can feel Thomas' fear, his confusion, but also his exhaustion. If Janus gets this wrong the man might well crumble completely. He'll be dust, then, walking and talking but dust still, ash gray and dry.

Janus needs to hurry this along.

He climbs from Logan's self-imposed cage and into the world of Patton's creation.

(Logan. Another necessity, and it's a pity, because he understands too well how it feels to fight to be heard. He keeps inflicting on Logan the same frustration that Janus so often faces himself, and it being necessary doesn't mean he can't regret it. He does not expect Logan will forgive him this.)

He drops his disguise and it stings, just a little, the way Thomas scrabbles so far back. The retreat is perfectly understandable...Janus is the villain of the story, after all. But Patton is the monster, and still Thomas recoils until he's in the beast's shadow.

_'Sure. The snake guy is **much** scarier then the **giant frog** who just tied you to a bridge over **lava**.' _ It helps sometimes, letting himself be bitter, even if only in his own head. Still, at least their reaction to his reveal is gratifyingly dramatic. 

“Who's misleading who?” Thomas asks, and it's good to know he's been listening despite the chaos around him. That's always been one of Thomas' greatest strengths. Robots and courtrooms and liars on stage, and still Thomas never loses himself completely in the madness. 

Janus lassos Thomas with his cane. Pulls the man behind him. Places himself between Thomas and the threat, and oh. Yes. That feels right. He's finally, finally, where he's supposed to be. 

He half expects Thomas to try to dash back. Already has his cane extended to the side to stop him. It's a surprise and a relief when he stays. 

“Patton is misleading you,” Janus says, and he might have left it there. But...

“He didn't mislead you on purpose, Thomas.” His goal isn't to drive a schism between Thomas and his heart. He only wants the heart to listen. Janus has never wanted to take control, only to share it. And if that doesn't fit his aesthetic, well, he always has been contradictory. 

Roman stands with Patton, of course. (Roman. Another regret. Janus knows how much it cost him, choosing the wedding. He's always been frail, Roman. Perhaps because he's only half of a whole, or perhaps because he's so often asked to deny his very purpose. Janus is not entirely sure he can pull Thomas through this without shattering Roman in a way that will leave him jagged. Collateral damage, but at least he's not the only one inflicting it. Patton is just as guilty in that regard.) 

Janus speaks truth. Powerful truth, pointed truth. The words become his weapon, and when the glowing, splintered mass strikes true Patton groans and flinches. The sharp words carve runnels in his skin. He bleeds baby blue, a striking contrast against the wrinkled, warty green. 

More truth, another strike. Patton is weakening, now. He slouches, using one long hand to support himself. The words cluster across his chest like porcupine quills. Stuck deep, and almost. Almost there. 

Patton's voice is weak when he speaks. Wavering, tremulous. More 'I don't knows' and 'Maybes', but alongside them is a core of bristling, dangerous truth. Because when Patton asks if Thomas deserves to put himself first, they all know it isn't really a question. They all know that Patton  **does** have an answer. 

No. 

The orb of it floats in the air. Buzzing and crackling, shining the same blue as Patton's blood. His tongue darts out to gather out, and his throat (paler then the rest of his skin, a sickly off-white) bulges thick. Patton spits his venom...

...and Janus does the hardest thing he's ever had to do in his life. It goes against everything he  **is** . It  **hurts** . It's glass in his lungs, fire in his blood, burning bile in his belly. It feels like swallowing his own death, this choice, but it's so, so  **necessary** . 

Janus steps aside. 

He hears Thomas' small, startled gasp. Hears his body hit the soaked and moldy carpet, a meaty thud. Feels the shock of it, the disbelief. His own heart. 

(Janus knows this will haunt him. He'll dream of it, that gasp, that thud. It will live in him forever, this betrayal of himself. He's self-preservation, yes, but not his own. He's  **Thomas** self-preservation, and what he has done this day is already like a cancer in him. It  **festers** .) 

Even then,  **even then,** Patton doesn't notice. Even as Roman stands horrified, hands over his mouth, eyes fixated on the limp body of the man he had sacrificed so much to serve. 

Janus has to literally point out the damage done. “You've gone too far,” he says, and finally it happens. 

Finally, Patton breaks. 

He looks at Thomas, and, for perhaps the first time in a very long time,  **sees** him. Sees him completely, their Thomas. Small and tired and oh so human.

It happens quickly after that. Patton slumps. The world around them drains of color. Dissolves like smoke, and they are back where they began. 

“I really don't know what I'm talking about,” Patton admits. Relief makes Janus dizzy. Of all of them, he's least worried about Patton. Naive and dumb as a brick, sometimes, but the one thing Patton isn't is stubborn. He doesn't hold onto old ways out of pride. Once he knows he's done wrong, he's not just willing but eager to change- it's a great virtue, one that few possess. 

“We can still beat him,” Roman insists, and oh, what has to happen next is going to **hurt**. Janus has always admired Roman. They're both dramatic bitches; how could he not? 

“No, he's right,” Patton says. 

It's all that Janus hoped for. All that he needs. An opening. 

Janus steps forward and readies himself. 

Time to put the pieces back together. 


End file.
